Some back story first. I have been adding the screens for my i50/i70 instrumentation. I went out to the boat on Saturday to wire things up. Of note, last year when I moved my compass to the other side of the boat, I pulled of the headliner down to drill the hole and found a pair of red and black wires, connected to nothing. I think you can see where this is starting to go.... So I get to the boat, I had had battery voltage issues, LED's would flash bright and then go dim. All worked great last year and I "made no changes". So I put the meter on my brand new Group 27 battery and it reads 12.5. Sweet. Go to my bus bars, 12.5. Again, sweet. I open a light fixture, 9..... well that's not good. So I unscrew the panel screws and pull it out. The positive wire pops out of the "crimped" spade connector. Well hot damn. I kind of put it back in and we have 12.5 at the panel. Hmmm.... I look at the negative connection and go "Hmmmmmm...... that looks like a 4 year old did it."
So now I figure the wiring is a wee bit fubar and I would just like to remove all the interestingly marked with masking tape labels of "Bad", no idea where they run to but, hopefully one of the runs is to the mystery wires I mentioned earlier. I pull down more head liner and I see that a PO decide to run all new wire, and wrap the ENTIRE run(s), from the panel to what ever fixture and what not, in black E-Tape. Ya know, the gooey gawd awful crap. So now I am thoroughly weaving my tapestry of obscenities directed at the brain trust that thought this was a grand idea. Sure, a bit here and there may for chafe protection, some at the head of the run to get it through all together but, this..... FFS!
It took me near 3 hours of unraveling this crap. Unravel a bit, cut off the tail, continue. /sigh A fellow sailor was walking by as I was trying to drink away my pain and suffering and we started to chat about my dilemma. I told him I was ready to start banging my head on the dock as it it had a higher possibility of reward at this point. He mentioned dealing with similar electrical fun on his Shock 25 in Bayfield. Well, anyway, I got the main run undone, oh yeah, they attached the wire runs to the boat with Gray Duct Tape. More gooey fun!! As I said I got the main wire run and a bit of the stragglers undone. The wires to nowhere are now gone, thought the ones marked "Bad", I still need to find their terminus.
I ended up taking the wood panel out of the boat that the old electrical panel was mounted in. It is in my garage and I am laying out my new setup. AC breakers, new 8 breaker panel, on off switch, and battery monitor. All new main line wire from the battery to the bus bars and panel as well. New shore power & charger. Got it all nicely diagrammed out. Seeing as there is no official racing, I might as well make it all new again. Might run some new wire too, in the correct colors even.....
Very nicely wrapped and how about that negative connection?? Sweet eh?
More of the awesomeness.
So now I figure the wiring is a wee bit fubar and I would just like to remove all the interestingly marked with masking tape labels of "Bad", no idea where they run to but, hopefully one of the runs is to the mystery wires I mentioned earlier. I pull down more head liner and I see that a PO decide to run all new wire, and wrap the ENTIRE run(s), from the panel to what ever fixture and what not, in black E-Tape. Ya know, the gooey gawd awful crap. So now I am thoroughly weaving my tapestry of obscenities directed at the brain trust that thought this was a grand idea. Sure, a bit here and there may for chafe protection, some at the head of the run to get it through all together but, this..... FFS!
It took me near 3 hours of unraveling this crap. Unravel a bit, cut off the tail, continue. /sigh A fellow sailor was walking by as I was trying to drink away my pain and suffering and we started to chat about my dilemma. I told him I was ready to start banging my head on the dock as it it had a higher possibility of reward at this point. He mentioned dealing with similar electrical fun on his Shock 25 in Bayfield. Well, anyway, I got the main run undone, oh yeah, they attached the wire runs to the boat with Gray Duct Tape. More gooey fun!! As I said I got the main wire run and a bit of the stragglers undone. The wires to nowhere are now gone, thought the ones marked "Bad", I still need to find their terminus.
I ended up taking the wood panel out of the boat that the old electrical panel was mounted in. It is in my garage and I am laying out my new setup. AC breakers, new 8 breaker panel, on off switch, and battery monitor. All new main line wire from the battery to the bus bars and panel as well. New shore power & charger. Got it all nicely diagrammed out. Seeing as there is no official racing, I might as well make it all new again. Might run some new wire too, in the correct colors even.....
Very nicely wrapped and how about that negative connection?? Sweet eh?
More of the awesomeness.
